ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Public Health
Sec. Health Economics
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1605887
This article is part of the Research TopicNational Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month 2025: Current Progress and Future Prospects on Colorectal Cancer Prevention, Diagnosis and TreatmentView all 3 articles
Medical Treatment Cost for Chinese Inpatients with Colorectal Cancer by Sites
Provisionally accepted
Zeng-Bao Hu1
Jin-Ying Huang2Stuart Mcdonald1Bo-Xu Chen3Hao-Xun Mao3Zhou Wu3Xiao-Yu Dai3
Hua Yu3Jian-Jiong Li3*
Yi Lin1*- 1The University of Nottingham Ningbo (China), Ningbo, China
- 2College of International Economics and Trade, Ningbo University of Finance and Economics, Zhejiang, China
- 3Ningbo Second Hospital, Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Background: The increasing prevalence of colorectal cancer (CRC) is a challenge for China's healthcare system. Using hospitalization data from Ningbo, China, this study aims to estimate the medical treatment cost and cost structure of CRC based on tumor sites to gain insights with respect to the cost efficiency of early diagnosis.Methods: A retrospective observational study was performed in a real-life clinical setting of a tertiary hospital in Ningbo, China.Sociodemographic, clinicopathologic, and CRC medical treatment cost data were extracted from the inpatients' medical records. The study comprised inpatients aged above 18 diagnosed with CRC and received surgical treatment between 2020 and 2022. CRC costs were separated into six cost categories and analyzed separately by tumor site (rectum and colon). All cost data were measured by 2020 Chinese Yuan.Results: A total of 538 inpatients were included, where 63.9% were male, 67.5% were diagnosed with rectal cancer, and 47.2% were at Stages III and IV. Medical treatment costs of rectal cancer increased significantly from Stage I to Stage IV in all cost categories (p<0.001), with percentage increases ranging from 70% to 120%, depending on cost category. Medication, materials, and examinations were the major sources of CRC costs for both rectal and colon cancers, with each accounting for 20%-30% of total costs, depending on tumor site and cancer stage.Conclusions: Targeted programs for the management and treatment of various tumor sites should be considered, as rectal cancer costs are more stage-sensitive than colon cancer. The large proportion of costs attributed to medication, materials, and examinations provides guidance to the government in regulating the healthcare market to alleviate the economic burden of CRC.
Keywords: China, colorectal cancer, Medical costs, economic burden, stage at diagnosis
Received: 04 Apr 2025; Accepted: 21 May 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Hu, Huang, Mcdonald, Chen, Mao, Wu, Dai, Yu, Li and Lin. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Jian-Jiong Li, Ningbo Second Hospital, Ningbo, 315010, Zhejiang Province, China
Yi Lin, The University of Nottingham Ningbo (China), Ningbo, China
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.